(Courtesy Necco)
If saying “I love you” on Valentine’s Day is too saccharine, how about mixing it up with “te amo?”
Necco, maker of the iconic Valentine’s candy called Sweethearts, added the Spanish expression of love to their conversational hearts this year.
“People get excited to see not just ‘I love you’ – obviously [classic phrases] like those are still special – but having these different ways to say and express their feelings, they gravitate toward it,” Mary Lane, Necco’s social media specialist, told Fox News Latino.
The brand also added the French “je t’aime,” along with other new symbols and phrases, including a mustache and “bff.” Some hearts are printed with “143,” a text code referring to the number of letters used in “I love you.”
Every year, the team at Necco reviews the messages printed on their candy hearts and swaps out the dated ones for something fresh, drawing inspiration from things like social media and customer feedback. Lane thinks that though “te amo” may have been used before in their English line, the time was right to bring it back.
“We saw a hole where we definitely wanted to have a way to express love in every language,” said Lane, who added that there is great interest in expanding the languages used and adding more Spanish phrases in the future.
In addition to the English line of candy, the brand also sells a Spanish version that has proved popular not only among Latino consumers but among Spanish teachers. That line contains phrases such as “ámame,” “besos,” “vamos,” “mi joyita,” and, of course, “te amo.”
National demographic changes inspired other companies dabbling in mushy messages to include offerings appealing to Spanish speakers. Brachs also sells a Spanish line of conversational hearts (and, of course, an English version) with the phrases "todo bien," "que tal?" and "amiga" and Hallmark has a line of Spanish greeting cards.
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